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Off-day discrimination at Safeco story has legs

Yup. Story of the off-day. Regardless of whether this is part of the M’s general-if-oft-unenforced anti-affection policy or they’ve got a secret no-gay policy or it’s all exaggerated, this is a really, really bad story for the M’s and they’re handling it pretty ineptly so far.

Comments

110 Responses to “Off-day discrimination at Safeco story has legs”

frankb. on
May 29th, 2008 10:32 pm

We really struggle when there is no game. I read the article and see 90-something posts. There has been a lot of philosophical discussion about a worthwhile topic, but it’s just a news article. I’m think I’m agreeing with ManageWA. I have questions. Have you ever been misquoted or taken out of context by a reporter? Isn’t the only source Ms. Guerrero? How can we devote this kind of time to this article? Can you see all the conjecture that’s been created? We’re talking about Nazis and parenting, and intolerance, and publicity stunts, and how does this relate to the M’s?
Ms. Guerrero said she only “pecked” her partner. Have you ever listened to kids explain what they did to someone? “Barely pushed” or something like that? Who is the source for the story? She said the usher told her there had been a complaint and told her to stop. She told the usher she wouldn’t. The M’s announce at every game if you feel someone is violating the policy to tell an usher. Ms. Guerrero said the usher told Ms. her to stop. Who made the choice here?
I’m having a hard time being a fan these days, but the M’s say they’ll interview people involved and they’d never target same sex couples. I’m okay with that for a start. I’m surprised at the time spent on this story. I can’t believe I read all the posts. Maybe we should have a post where everyone creates hypothetical situations where the M’s FO do things wrong. Is this story really a legitimate reason to be critical of the Mariners?
Sorry for the long post. I really liked how Bedard threw last night. Maybe we’ll be be like the ’59 White Sox or the ’64 Dodgers- winning lots of games 1-0 or 2-1.

Milendriel on
May 29th, 2008 10:39 pm

We know that the mother couldâ€™ve taken it upon herself and moved, or asked an usher to reseat her.

We don’t know if she did or didn’t, though.

We know that the mother couldâ€™ve simply told her child to pay attention to the game, or that itâ€™s not polite to worry about what other people are doing with each other.

Ditto.

We know, instead, that the mother chose to demand that Safeco Field personnel interfere on her behalf and embarass two people in public who werenâ€™t doing anything that hetero couples donâ€™t do in Safeco Field all the time.

We already agree that if she wanted the girls to stop because their behavior goes against her beliefs, she’s wrong. But that makes her wrong, not narrow-minded. You’re making a dispositional attribution (and a very broad one at that) based on a single incident. There’s no case to be made that she habitually discriminates against homosexuals, nor even that she’s prejudiced against them at all. She wants to raise her children a certain way and maybe she didn’t think about the situation as deeply as we are. There’s also no evidence that she “demanded” anything. She may have been extremely civil.

Sure, it’s possible that the mother is really the innocent, misunderstood victim in all of this, and that she really is a fair-minded and non-prejudiced person who has no problems with homosexuality.

If you can present me with evidence to show that, I’m willing to rethink my position, but until then, I’m comfortable with making a reasonable judgment based on the information I do have.

Because the simple hypothesis of this being someone who thinks homosexuality should still be kept in closets is a lot more likely than the convoluted “but maybe” scenarios that people keep bringing up, and it frankly makes me a little queasy how willing people are to try to explain away her actions as “not really that big of a deal”, or even ACCEPTABLE.

So, in summation, it’s probably time for me to bow out of this comment thread.

frankb. on
May 29th, 2008 10:48 pm

I appreciate Jeff Nye’s thoughtful posts and I read what he wrote about what we know. Those are reasonable assumptions and suggestions, but but we don’t even know if there was a mother. How do we know if she’s wrong, or narrow-minded, or habitually discriminates? Who’s fault is it if we don’t even know what or if anything happened?

Milendriel on
May 29th, 2008 11:12 pm

Jeff Nye- No, the simple hypothesis is that she saw behavior that was against the stadium rules and complained. She’s a thirdhand source in this story. How would you feel if someone judged you based on what someone said someone said you said? I’ve already outlined that I agree with you IF her motives were what you think they were. But I don’t agree we have nearly enough information to make that judgment, and it makes ME queasy that people have such a low threshhold for denigrating the character of others.

vj on
May 30th, 2008 2:51 am

displays of affection are not appropriate in a public family setting

Does this rule refer to the whole ballpark or just the designated family seating areas, where you are not supposed to drink alcohol?

terry on
May 30th, 2008 5:50 am

There were Bible verses used to justify every kind of racial discrimination as well, so you could argue that those views were/are â€œmorally justifiedâ€ for the same reasons anti-gay garbage is â€œmorally justified.â€

No.

Because people have misapplied Bible verses in the past does not invalidate all other moral judgements that might be based upon biblical teachings.

We won’t agree on this, Terry, and I’m not sure this is the venue for this discussion, but to be fair, I did not say (and don’t believe) that “all other moral judgements” based on the Bible are invalid. I do think anti-gay ideas are, however, and I think in this case, the interracial dating metaphor is accurate.

terry on
May 30th, 2008 7:21 am

The Bible couldn’t be clearer concerning the spiritual significance of the “biblical union between a man and a wife” and the context in which sex is meaningful. In a religious sense, marriage and it’s associated relations is very much an act of worship.

I’m not arguing it’s appropriate to demand conformity to a Biblical standard in America (my right to worship as I see fit is essentially derived from a principle that suggests it’s not appropriate for me to demand others conform to my beliefs).

I’m simply arguing that those that apply such a Biblical standard in their personal daily lives are not bigots by default nor should it be assumed that they de facto discriminate against those which do not apply similar standards in their own lives.

Where this mother crossed the line was when she apparently used the usher to bully others into conforming to her ideals.

Kouvre on
May 30th, 2008 8:18 am

88

I sincerely hope your post is being sent in some form to the Mariners’ FO. Maybe if they start losing ticket sales (with specific explanations, otherwise they’ll just think people stopped going because of this horribly untalented team), they’ll listen.